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Engineers need a strong association to assist, support and represent them in their work and the VDI (Association of German Engineers) has taken on this role for more than 150 years. With over 150,000 members and over 12,000 volunteer experts, the VDI is by far the largest engineers’ association in Germany.

The challenge: a management assessment to develop the organisation and its people

The VDI sought to deploy a management assessment not only to ensure that the management guidelines of the organisation are applied and that a two-way feedback culture is reinforced, but also to further develop the organisation itself. The VDI also saw that such assessment also provides managers self-insight which in turn supports their own development. The VDI wanted an online assessment process which could be accessed and completed from any PC within the company. cut-e was recommended and chosen as an innovative, reliable external service provider.

The solution: an assessment based on organisational competencies

The 360 degree assessment was derived from the VDI’s management guidelines and management competency model. The questionnaire consists of 40 statements and an additional four open questions. In these open questions, the feedback provider is asked to state clearly which behavioural traits the manager should retain in the future, which traits required improvement, which other traits the manager demonstrates and which of these they should not use in the future. It is important with any assessment deployment to decide and communicate how it will work in practice early in the project and the VDI did this. Not only did it consider the practicalities of taking part, but also re-emphasised the reasons for introducing this assessment process to facilitate co-operation and embed an open feedback culture.

Case S

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E-mail: info@cut-e.com www.cut-e.com

A few weeks after the initial project meeting between cut-e and the VDI, the online feedback system with the company-specific questionnaire was available and the assessment process began. All participants were guaranteed absolute anonymity and encouraged to give fair assessments and it was emphasised that ‘nobody is perfect’ and ‘everyone has potential for improvement’. The employees had two weeks to complete the assessment and because at least four feedback reviews were needed to ensure anonymity for each feedback group, two reminder mails were issued to those who had not completed feedback. The return quota was a successful 87 per cent.

The outcome: individual reports, benchmarking and group reports signpost areas for development

Once the feedback stage was complete, individual reports were created. These indicated the strengths and development areas and provided a foundation for focused development intervention. VDI also chose to include an internal benchmark in the report giving further information to the manager. Group reports were compiled which enabled the planning of combined development workshops for managers targeting development specific needs. “We were very satisfied with the cooperation on this project. Our service provider, cut-e, understood our wishes and implemented them in a flexible manner, the project management was smoothly and the processing was extremely reliable.” Michael Schwartz, Area Head Strategy & Communication at VDI (Association of German Engineers)

For any further information please don’t hesitate to contact us! E-Mail: info@cut-e.com www.cut-e.com